Thursday, May 19, 2016

The Frozen Kingdom, Chapter 4



Chapter 4 of The Frozen Kingdom is now available for preview.

That's probably it for May updates. In June I expect to have Chapter 3 updates and Chapter 5 out for preview.

Download 

Chapter 4 - Välásir: Google Doc | PDF
The Frozen Kingdom Bestiary: Google Doc | PDF

This chapter delves into a bit more of the mythology of the world and begins to set up the main adventure arc. The players must find a clue towards what Zerith Amastatica is looking for hidden deep beneath the city of Sylridian.

This chapter features a medium-sized puzzle dungeon and encounters with new and familiar enemies.

Level 3 characters. Estimated playing time: 2 hours.

The Frozen Kingdom Chapters

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Saturday, May 14, 2016

Chapter 2 Updates


Following playtesting this weekend, Chapter 2 of The Frozen Kingdom has been updated.

Download Chapter 2 - Dragon's Teeth: Google Doc | PDF
The Frozen Kingdom Bestiary: Google Doc | PDF

There were only a few changes for clarity and some minor editing this time around since this module overlaps with Chapter 1 a fair bit.

One clear piece of feedback received was that it is too similar to chapter 1 in terms of setting and encounters. Without giving too much away, most of the similarity was intentional and logical. Nevertheless if this feedback is repeated I will re-tool parts to make it a more unique experience.

Another piece of feedback was that Bottle Knight fights weren't interesting enough after the nerf. In response to that I've changed them yet again. They now have a battlefield control ability - leaving puddles of acid around after missed acid shots and AoE spray attacks. This is balanced out by the puddle only doing damage if a player walks into it or ends their turn in that space, to give creatures already hit by the AoE a chance to move and avoid extra damage. Additional testing will be required to see if this makes the encounter more "interesting" in a way that is fair but challenging.

Playing time came in just under 3 hours for a party of 5 with some inexperienced players a lot of table chatter. More focused and experienced groups could probably do it in 2. For such groups I recommend playing chapters 1 and 2 back-to-back as they together comprise most of the "introduction" part of this story.

The Frozen Kingdom Chapters

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Sunday, April 17, 2016

Frozen Kingdom Chapter 1 Updates

Following a playtest this weekend I've updated The Frozen Kingdom chapter 1.

Notable changes include:
  • Removed irrelevant section about the Sylridian Helix that doesn't have any importance until Chapter 3 and is repeated there anyways
  • Clarified wording in Taneth's quest speech
  • Added description of Bottle Knight defensive tactics
Bestiary changes include:
  • Nerfed Bottle Knight damage output
  • Changed Bottle Knight abilities because they were too similar to Ice Mephits already encountered in Ch.1
Updated documents can be downloaded here:

Chapter 1 - Mog the Missing: Google Doc | PDF
The Frozen Kingdom Bestiary: Google Doc | PDF

The Frozen Kingdom Chapters

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Tuesday, April 12, 2016

The Frozen Kingdom, Chapter 3

As promised, it's done early!
Module 3 of The Frozen Kingdom is now available for playtest.

This one is different from the first two in a few important ways: First off, it's much heavier on narrative and exposition as it expands upon events from the first two chapters. Second, it takes place entirely within Sylridian at various locations in the city. Lastly, it contains a couple skill-challenge encounters as well as traditional combat. I guess what I'm saying is, "roleplayers and skillmonkeys, this one's for you."

I said this one would be short like chapter 2 but it's actually the longest by page-count. Go figure.

#3 The Girl from the Glacier (CR 2)

Google Doc | PDF

The Bestiary has been updated with monsters from this episode:
Google Doc | PDF

The Frozen Kingdom Chapters

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Friday, April 1, 2016

The Frozen Kingdom, Chapter 2

The second module of my new campaign for 5th Edition is now complete and ready to playtest.

This one is kinda short but it contains one of the pivotal RP moments from the story. Episode 3 is also a short-ish RP focused module which I'm already off to a good start on so it will probably be done ahead of schedule.

The Frozen Kingdom Ch. 2 - Dragon's Teeth (CR 2)

 The Bestiary has been updated with monsters from this episode:

The Frozen Kingdom Chapters

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Thursday, March 17, 2016

The Frozen Kingdom, Chapter 1

The first chapter of my new adventure for 5th Edition is now complete and ready to playtest. When I played this with a test group it was about 2 hours long. My goal is for each chapter to be 2-3 hours in length.

I hope to crank these out once per month but we'll see how that goes with testing and revision work.

The Frozen Kingdom Ch. 1 - Mog the Missing (CR 1)

The Frozen Kingdom - Bestiary

The Frozen Kingdom Chapters

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Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Updated map of Teredahar






Writing new modules got me in the mood to make a new map. This is an update and colourization of the previous hand-drawn map. I've drawn colour maps of Teredahar before but this is by far the best-looking. Details are sparse in this version but it's drawn at very high resolution so I can zoom in for locality maps and add detail as necessary, keeping in mind the rule of Conservation of Detail.

The scale has dramatically changed from the previous map in order to put locations at more Earth-like latitudes for their given climate. At the new (and hopefully final) scale Teredahar is about 2/3 the area of North America. It's 2000 miles as the crow flies from Sylridian to Kivan Torrat and the continent is 3000 miles east to west at its widest. That's nearly triple what it was before but properly scaled for an Earth-sized planet. As always, this scale is purely for aesthetics.
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